Unraveling The Past
by authorincognito
Summary: Skylar has always lived a regular life, but all of that is thrown out of proportion by his discovery of a strange object. Now he must discover his mysterious conection to the object, and overcome the fear that his time may be running out. The events of the last gaurdian never happened. Suspense/ Adventure/ Mystery. Rated T for violence.
1. Chapter 1

One Saturday morning Skylar Oakland woke up to find his little sister's pet dog sitting firmly on his chest. The dog- which was a poodle- wasn't very heavy, so it did not cause much trouble with his breathing. " Get off." He mumbled as he pushed the dog off his chest and down on to the floor. He sat up in his bed and yawned, stretching his arms above his head. Morning light fell through his window, whose curtains were pulled back, and down onto him. He smirked as he looked at the mirror adjecant to his bed as counted slowly in his head, waiting for his little sister to come and wish him a happy birthday, just as she always did.

As he counted he stared at his reflection. Skylar had long, messy, dark brown-almost-black hair and hazel eyes. His skin was fairly tanned despite the fact that he wasn't a real outdoors-y person. Truth be told, he wasn't, as most teen girls would call it, "hot", though Skylar thought he was decent-looking. Of course, Skylar had never really cared about looks. That didn't mean that he didn't care about personal hygeine- he just didn't care about all the latest fashion trends or how good he looked. He honestly didn't understand why guys- and girls- would wish that they were more handsome or beautiful. He also didn't understand while all of them- in general- were practically desperate to have a girlfriend or boyfriend. Honestly, he could care less about having a girlfriend, though if he had to choose one, it would definitely be his best friend Blake Nite.

Blake and Skylar had been best friends since elementary school, where they met on the school playground. Skylar had been being beat up by a bully by the name of Jon Smiltzer when Blake had stepped in. That day, Jon learned a very important lesson: You do not, under any circumstance, mess with Blake Night. When Jon had began to bully her, she had promptly flipped him over onto his back- an impressive feat, for she was very small, and he was very large- and had started to beat him into a pulp. Their teacher had come over and stopped them, but the damage had been done; Jon had to be sent to the hospital because of his broken fingers, and Blake had been sentenced to a week of suspension. Shortly after that, the friendship between Skylar and Blake began to form.

Skylar and Blake's friendship was probably one of the strangest thing that people had ever even seen or heard of. While they both liked the same type of music ( which was rock) they were almost totally different. While Skylar was quite, soft-spoken, book-smart, and obedient, Blake was loud, out-spoken, street-smart, and a bit of a rebel. Most people had said that that friendship wouldn't even last a day- their friendship had been going on for at least nine years now, and it only got stronger with each passing day.

Suddenly, there was the sound of a rock hitting his window. Skylar shot up out of the bed and headed toward the window. Well speak of the devil- there, standing on the ground, was Blake Nite. Truth be told, she was a very pretty girl. Her usually white-blond hair was dyed jet black and her skin was pale. Her almost electrifying blue eyes seemed to send bolts of lightening through Skylar's body. Above her right eye there was the eyebrow ring that she had gotten as a birthday present a year ago. She wore a pair of somewhat baggy jeans and an Evanescence t-shirt.

Seeing that Skylar had noticed her, she began to make motions with her hands to tell him to open the window, which he did. Fast as lightening, Blake climbed the tree that was next to his house. Within seconds she was in his room and had smothered him in a warm hug.

She pulled away, and for once there was a smile on her face. " Happy birthday, Sky." Sky. That was what everybody normally called Skylar. It had began when he had been a small child and had a strange fascination with the...erm... sky. Not outer space, but with the actual sky.

" Hey, Blake." Skylar said as Blake sat down upon his bed. Blake did this almost everyday before they went to school, since there houses, coincidentally, were on the same street. Luckily she always came early, so Skylar was almost always asleep. Skylar had joked that he didn't even need an alarm clock- oh, no, he had something better: Blake. They had begun this morning ritual-type-thing three years ago on their first day of highschool. One could imagine Skylar's shock and surprise to wake up to find his best friend leaning over him- he had left the window open that night.

" So how's the birthday boy doing today?" Blake asked, and now Skylar could now see that her smile had been forced. " Good. You?" He asked, concerned.

Blake tensed, immediately defensive. " Yeah, why shouldn't I be?" She now gripped the bed covers tightly in her hands, and her lips formed a rather tight line against each other.

" Blake..." Skylar said. He could always tell when she was upset about something- well, almost always. Blake was exceptionally good at hiding her feelings.

Slowly, very slowly, she relaxed her hands and her mouth. " It's mom." she said blankly, staring at the wall in front of her. Yet another thing that Blake was good at: not crying. In fact, the only time that Skylar could remember Blake ever crying was at her father's funeral... that was it. That was why Blake was so upset. No, it wasn't because of her father- she had long excepted that he was dead- no, it was because of what happened after her father died. After her father died, Blake's mother had sunk into a deep depression, and had turned to alcohol for comfort. Six years had passed, and Blake's mother was- for a lack of another word- uncontrollable. She would drink alcohol day and night, trying to ease her pain. Skylar didn't know how Blake managed it, but she somehow did. " What happened?" He asked, wrapping one arm around her shoulder.

Wordlessly, Blake lifted the sleeve of her Evanescence t-shirt, where four long scratch marks ran up and down the length of her arm. Skylar gasped. " Wh- what happened?"

" She threw something at me, and I tried to dodge it, but I tripped and fell on a broken bottle." Blake said as Skylar examined her arm.

When he was done, Skylar looked up with pure concern on his face. "Blake, your mom needs help." Blake nodded, but Skylar could see that she thought it to be a lost cause. They had tried countless times to get Blake's mother some help, but had all attempts had been unsuccessful. The last time that they had tried it was a year and a half ago, and it had earned Blake a broken wrist.

Skylar removed his arm from around her and stood up from the bed, holding his hand out to her. Blake blinked and, wordlessly, grasped it and stood up as well. Skylar put both hands upon her shoulders. "Don't worry. Everything will be alright." Skylar had said these two simple sentences so many times that he had lost count. He knew that they were fruitless attempts to comfort her in her current situation, but still he tried. It was the only thing he could think of doing to give her. Blake turned her head to the side, and Skylar knew that she didn't believe him.

What seemed like no time at all, the door to Skylar's room opened and in stepped Arabella Oakland, Skylar's- somewhat annoying- little sister. " Come on Sky. Breakfast is ready." Arabella suddenly smirked, and as Skylar got the feeling that she was going to say something remotely embarrasing- for him anyways. " You can let your girlfriend come and eat with us." Quickly as she came, Arabella turned on her heels and went downstairs to the kitchen.

Skylar turned awkwardly to Blake. "Uh, you know that I would never think of anything... romantically about you right ...?" Skylar said, looking anywhere but Blakes eyes, fearing that they would see something that would make her think the opposite.

Suddenly, Blake laughed, which was a rare occurence as it were, and Skylar stopped his worrying to stare at her in awe. " Y-you laughed." He said, failing at his feeble attempts to hold his surprise back.

Blake stopped laughing, and so managed to talk again. " Of course I do, Sky. And it's not like I would think of you as my 'prince charming'." Blake scoffed and rolled her eyes jokingly. Skylar smiled at that, ignoring his conficting feelings, that made his mind whirl, for he did not know the cause of it. And he had the feeling that he didn't want to know, either.

Blake jerked her head toward Skylar's door. "Come on. Let's go down there before they send Arabella up again. Who knows what she'll tell your parents what we've been doing all this time." And with that Blake turned and walked out of the room, taking Skylar's jumbled emotions with her.

* * *

Three hours later, Skylar and Blake were now walking in the forest behind Skylar's house. Skylar had gotten a few presents this year( the new Three Days Grace album, a couple of t-shirts, and a new drawing kit) though he hadn't asked for anything, and his family knew that he didn't like to make a big fuss about his birthday. Not because he didn't like getting older; he just didn't understand why people made such a big deal out of it. It was just a regular day in the year, yet people treated it like a holiday. Well, for some people it probably was, but not for him.

Blake walked slighly in front of him, dragging a slim branch that fell from one of the trees above behind her, barely leaving a mark in the leave-strewn grass. The multi-colored leaves of the trees fell from there branches at random points in time, filling the ground once more with a blanket of leaves, as of trying to protect the ground from the coming winter months ahead.

Blake shivered slightly as a wind blew past them. " Geez, Sky." She said as she looked towards a gap in the trees, where houses could be seen boasting decorations for tonight. " Only you would have a birthday on Halloween. It's so...weird." Blake said as she turned her head to look at him.

Soon, Skylar was up beside of Blake as they walked aimlessy through the woods. " I thought you liked weird." He said, a smile in both his eyes and face.

Blake jerked her head up towards him, trying to look shocked. She succeeded. " That's right! I do!" And then they both started to laugh, oblivious to their surroundings.

About forty-five minutes into their walk, Blake stopped suddenly and kneeled down on the ground. Skylar knelt down beside her as she combed her fingers through the leaves. " What are you doing?" he asked.

"My earring fell out." Blake said, and Skylar saw that one of her skull earings had indeed fallen out( she had put them on after breakfast). Sighing, Skylar began to help her look for it. Within seconds she had found it and had stood up to go back to Skylar's house, but Skylar ignored her. His fingers had closed around a hard object that was most definetely not of nature origin. Slowly, very slowly, he lifted up his hand, not knowing that performing this otherwise innocent action would change the course of his and Blake's life forever.

Author's notes- I apologize for leaving you on the cliff-hanger there but... it was necessary. At least, I believe so. Of course, I could be wrong.

I know that as of right now, this looks almost as if it has nothing to do with Artemis Fowl, but it will. Trust me.

If you review, please give your honest opinion, but no flames, please.


	2. Chapter 2

Whatever Skylar had been expecting to find, this was most definetely not it. The object in his hands was very small- it could fit perfectly into the palm of his hands. The object was of a golden-yellow-y color, and it was one of the most strangest thing that Skylar had ever seen. It appeared to be a book- one could tell for its thin pages inside. On the cover of the miniscule book were these strange symbols- symbols that Skylar had never seen before, yet were strangely familiar. He racked the confines of his mind, trying to remember where and when he had seen them, but- Alas!- he could not remember. Everytime that he believed himself to be close, it would slip away and he would be brought back to where he had started. It was driving him mad. He just knew he had seen this before. Why couldn't he remember!?

Beside of him, Blake had bended over and was now looking at the tiny book in his hands, hands resting on her knees. " Whatcha got there, Sky?" Blake asked as Skylar turned the book over and over in his hand.

" I'm not sure." Skylar said, which was the truth, because he wasn't sure what it was supposed to be. Was it a book full of a secret language created by some person for code? Was it some type of artifact from hundreds of years before? This last question he doubted, for he was certain that there were no books here at the time.

Stretching out her fingers, Blake aimed to touch the book, as if wanting to see exactly what it was as well. However, as soon as she touched the object, she lept back in pain, clutching her right hand, as if trying to erase the pain by cutting off her circulation. Skylar looked up, shock and surprised. Why had Blake reacted like that? It was only a book... hmm. Maybe she had gotten a paper cut. Skylar looked back down at the book. No. The book had been closed, and Blake certaintly wouldn't have reacted that way if it were only a paper cut. In fact, Skylar was certain that she would have laughed it off and continued on her merry way. So.. no. It was most definetely not a paper cut.

Skylar stood up from the ground, racing toward his seemingly injured friend, dropping the book as he did so. He clutched Blake's right hand, trying to pry her left hand from it. " Come on, Blake!" Skylar said, exasperated at the fifth attempt of trying to pry her fingers from her hand. " Let me see what it did to you." He was honestly getting worried now; her hand was slowly turning blue. Once again, he was surprised at Blake's strength. Of course, the girl had once beaten up a guy three times her size, so maybe it wasn't all that surprising.

Silently, Blake removed her fingers, and Skylar was finally able to tell the damage that it had done. On all of the fingers on Blake'sright hand were a bright red raw; they looked as if she had held them in a fire for a short period of time. Skylar looked up at Blake, and saw that her eyes were wide in surprise.

Skylar swallowed, trying to mask the fear in his voice as he said, " Come on. Let's get back to the house. Maybe my mom will know what to do about it." Blake nodded her head and let Skylar lead her out of the forest.

In no time, they had arrived back at Skylar's place, where they were now sitting at the kitchen table where Mrs. Oakland was now examining Blakes's fingers. She tutted as she turned Blake's hand over and over. Mrs. Oakland had been a nurse for about four years by now, and Skylar was certain that she would know what was wrong with Blake.

Skylar still couldn't understand why the book had done that to her. It had shown no indication of harming him,but as soon as Blake had touched it, this had happened. He wished that he hadn't dropped it; he needed to figure out why it had done that.. that... whatever it was to Blake. Even now, when his best friend was injured, Skylar still couldn't shake the feeling that he had seen it somewhere before. Somewhere in a distant memory...

" Well it seems as if you have earned yourself a first degree burn. Fortunately, I have my first-aid kit here with me, and it is not severe enough to be taken to the hospital, so I'll just treat it here." Skylar vaguely heard his mother get up from the table and lead Blake to the first-aid kit she kept in the closet. Skylar just stayed at the table and stared out the window parrallel to him. The trees outside waved their branches at him, taunting him. As if they knew that he was drawn to the object in the forest. He didn't know why- which was all the more reason to go back and get it.

From the hall, Skylar heard his mother tell Blake, " Just keep doing that for a while more, and then you will be all right again." Skylar lifted his head as he saw his mother step into the room. Her arms were folded across her chest and her brow was furrowed. Mrs. Oakland was a tall, thin woman with wavy, dark blonde hair and hazel eyes. If it weren't for the fact that they both had hazel eyes, Skylar wouldn't have believed them to be related. Other than the eyes, they looked absolutely nothing alike, and while their personalities were vaguely similar to each other, they were almost nothing alike.

"What happened, Sky?" Mrs. Oakland asked, staring directly into Skylar's eyes. Skylar stared back at her, wanting her to know that whatever he said wasn't a lie.

" I do not know." He said firmly, trying his hardest not to blink.

Mrs. Oakland hmmed at this, and appeared to be in the deepest of thoughts before she said, " Well, then, do have any inkling as to how Blake got a first degree burn on her fingers?"

Skylar shook his head, and thankfully his mother didn't ask anymore questions. After all, how was he supposed to explain to her that a mysterious book had burned Blake? She would never have believed him if he had told her.

Mrs. Oakland stood there for a few minutes more, before going back to check on Blake. " OK, dear, I think that's good enough. You should try to be more careful." Skylar heard his mother tell Blake."

" Don't worry, Mrs. Oakland, I will be." Skylar heard Blake say before she stepped into the room. Blake looked remarkably better. Her face wasn't furrowed in pain anymore, and she looked like her old self. Well... her old self with a gauze wrapped around her hand.

" You all right?" Skylar asked, feeling a bit stupid while doing so. Blake snorted and rolled her eyes. " Nah, I just 'bout burnt most of my fingers off. I'm just peachy!" Skylar smiled as Blake walked the remainder of the room and sat down beside of him.

Looking around cautiously, she whispered into his ear, " Do you want to go back and get it?" Skylar blinked. He had been certain that Blake wouldn't want any more to do with that small book of strange symbols. Of course- as mentioned before- Blake was a lover of the weird and strange, so it wasn't all that surprising.

"I'm not sure." Skylar began as he looked warily towards the hall, where he knew his mother could be listening by the door. It wasn't that Skylar didn't want to retreive the book from the forest- no, that was almost all he could think about- but it was his fear of breaking the rules that prevented him from doing so. It was a ridiculous thing to be afraid of, he knew, but that didn't stop him from being scared of it.

"Don't worry Sky. Your mom went to watch the Twilight movies, and you know how much she loves those." Blake said, and Skylar nodded. Ever since the first movie came out, Mrs. Oakland had been obsessed. Throughout their enire home was Twilight merchendise, because with each coming movie, Mrs. Oakland would drive up to the mall and buy as much of it as she could. Honestly, Skylar could care less about twilight. A romance novel about a whiny teen human girl and a stalker male vampire, how lovely. Of course, his mother had forced him to watch all of the movies, and the last one he watched made him a bit squeamish. A hybrid baby between two different species. How disgusting!

But now... his mother's obsession with twilight came to his advantage, for while she would be watching the movie they would go outside and get the book out of the forest. But... there was still his father and Arabella. Though, come to think of it, his father wasn't much of a problem. Mr. Oakland was a mechanic who worked all days of the week except for Sundays. Years back, Mr. Oakland had tried to stem an interest in cars towards Skylar, to get a sort of family business , but with no effect. Skylar had had no patience with vehicles, and would have preferred to read a book during the times that his father had took him to work with him. And Arabella... hopefully she would be on her cell phone with one of her friends, talking about the latest drama that was going on at the middle school.

Smiling, Skylar looked up at Blake. " I'm in."

* * *

" Are you sure this is the place we found it?" Skylar asked as he and Blake traveled through the forest. They had been walking about for the past hour and still hadn't found anything. Skylar hoped they would find it soon, because he didn't know how long his mother and sister would miss their absense.

His mind began to spin with images of punishments of being outside without telling his parents. What would they do to punish him? Ground him for a week with no internet? He had never been grounded before, he had always chosen to abide by the rules, so if his parents did ground him, it would be an entirely new experience for him.

Suddenly, Blake gave a small shriek and pointed towards the ground. " Here! It's here!" Forgetting his worries, Skylar rushed to the place where Blake stood and, just like she said, there it was lying in the leaves. Cautiously, he picked it up and put it into his jeans pocket.

When he looked back up, Blake had the strangest of looks upon her face. " What?" He asked, oblivious as to why she looked like that.

Blake leaned up against the trunk of an old cedar tree. " Oh, nothing. I'm just trying to figure out why that tried to burn my hand off, yet it doesn't do anything to you at all." Not physically at least, thought Skylar.

" Don't know. Maybe it likes me better." Skylar joked, trying to erase the look on Blake's face, but with no results.

"I'm not so sure about this Sky..." Blake trailed off as she stared at Skylar's pants pocket. Skylar blinked. Blake was frightened, and it took a lot to scare Blake. Normally out of the two of them, she would be laughing in a horror movie whilst he would be the one covering up his eyes through two-thirds of the film.

" It was your idea." Skylar said, negletting to say that he would have went back for it anyways. Blake nodded and hugged herself, still looking nervously at Skylar's pants pocket. " Come on." She said as she started to walk back the way they came. " Let's go back."

Wrapped up in his thought, Skylar followed her. Why did the book and the strange symbols within it seem so familiar? If he had seen them before, then when? And where? What language was it in? Was it even a known language? Was it a language that had been lost through the ages? Skylar sincerely hoped that he could figure all this out soon, because he didn't know how much longer he could take without knowing why the book and the symbols inside seemed so familar to him.

Author's notes- Dear twilight fans, in no means did I mean to offend you in this chapter. Personally, I do like Twilight, though it's not my favorite book series. What was said about twilight during the course of this chapter was how Skylar viewed the book series, not me. As strange as that may seem.

And yes, the whole Blake gets burned but Skylar doesn't was intentional.

One more thing, if you review, please give your honest opinion, but no flames, please.


	3. Chapter 3

The remainder of the weekend passed by without incident, and by Monday Skylar and Blake were back at school. Throughout the entire morning, Skylar had not been paying attention in class as well as the teachers were used to- during math he gave a wrong answer to a problem even though math was his best suggest. was The reason for his lack of attention was the book. The day that he had found it, he had scoured the internet on his personal laptop in hopes of finding something- anything- that could possibly be the language in the book. He had worked well into the night, working to find his answers until almost four o'clock in the morning, when he had finally gave up and went to bed, promising himself that he would figure it out later that day.

However, that had never happend, as as soon as he woke up, he had to hurry to get dressed to go to church. And afterwards he had to go with his family to help out a local charity drive. When they had finally arrived back at their home, Skylar had been so exhausted that he had plum forgotten about the book, and had went straight off to sleep.

The next morning, Blake had woken him up by shaking his shoulder's repeatedly. " Get up, Sky." She whispered in his ear. " You don't want to be late for school. Unless you want to skip today." She said this last sentence mischeiveously, knowing that Skylar would never skip school for anything. Skylar opened his eyes to stare into Blake's blue ones, which were so close to him that he could see himself in them.

" Don't count on it." He mumbled as he dragged himself out of his bed. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes to get a better view of Blake. Unlike the clothing that she had worn over the weekend, the clothes she wore now were very bright. She wore bright yellow jeans and a white shirt equipped with various splotches of neon colors. Blake's daily attire were most certaintly not on most people's lists, as she generally wore either dark clothing or bright clothing that would garantee that you would get noticed anywhere that you went. Well, perhaps not New York City- after all, who knew how many strange things that were in the enormous city.

Skylar daily was usually a plain shirt with blue jeans, or a shirt with a band's symbol or picture. Arabella had once tried to get him to where one of the latest fashion trends- which would have no doubt went out of fashion in a few months time- to help get him a girlfriend. Why Arabella had taken an interest in his love life, he never found out, though he suspected it had something to do with the fact that the the only girl that he hung out with that wasn't related to him in any way was Blake. Eventually, Skylar had succombed to Arabella's wishes and had bought the clothing and had worn them for one day, where thus he had decided that he officialy hated them and refused to ever wear them again. The clothes had been sold at a yard sell soon after.

" Did you found out anything else about that book?" Blake asked. Skylar knew that Blake was curious to find out where the book came from as well, although she wasn't as curious as Skylar. Mainly because she didn't get this weird sense of de ja vu that Skylar always got whenever he so much as glanced at the thing.

When Skylar shook his head, Blake nodded and said, " I'll step out to let you get dressed.", leaving Skylar alone in his room. Skylar looked over at his bed, where he had placed the book between the mattresses to prevent his parents finding out about it. After all, he didn't think that his parents wouldn't react very well when they learned of his fascination with a book of strange symbols. Sighing, he gave one last final look at the bed before he turned and made his way over to his closet.

* * *

Exactly one half hour later, Skylar and Blake were sitting together on the bus as they traveled to their local high school. The high school that they went to was pretty small- at least in terms of the population. There were currently only about three hundred students attending, some from the town in which Blake and Skylar lived, some from neighboring towns. Skylar, who had never been a people person, liked the school's population just as it was. The bullies, however, he could do without.

There were perhaps a dozen known bullies at the high school, and in Skylar's first year of high school they had all made a silent vow to make sure Skylar's life at school would be miserable. This had worked for about a week or so, before the said bullies had realized that they would only be able to beat Skylar up whenever Blake wasn't around. They had learned this whenever Blake had punched them so hard that if she hadn't been stopped by three teachers then she could have been charged with a crime. So, yes, ever since that time the bullies decided to make sure that Skylar was alone before they started to bully him.

Other than that, Skylar loved school. He loved to learn the things that there teachers taught him. He loved the sport that he did- although he knew Blake would disagree with that, because in her view, chess wasn't a sport. True, the cafeteria food could be better but all in all, Skylar loved school... apart from the bullies previously mentioned.

A few seconds later, they had arrived at their school, which was an old, partly worn down old brick building that had yet to have all the new high tech stuff going around in the schools in the city. Skylar, Blake, and the rest of their fellow students on the bus made their way over to the bus doors, making a point to walk as slow as possible.

Whenever they got into the building, Skylar and Blake had to go seperate ways, for their first classes were on opposite sides of the building, though soon they were brought together again in study hall, which they had in the library. Skylar had been starting his homework when Blake had sat down next to him at his table. " Hey." she said as she set her backpack down nest to her. Why Blake carried that thing around all day around on school, he didn't know, although it didn't seem to bother her.

"Hey." Skylar said as he turned the page of his math book. After he was halfway through his second problem on the nest page, Skylar felt eyes on him, and, true to his instincts, Blake was staring at him.

" What?" He asked, staring around to make sure it was himself that Blake was staring at so intently.

Blake shrugged. " Nothing. I'm just trying to figure out why your so interested in that stuff. I mean, most guys around here are more interested in getting a girlfriend then be caught dead doing homework."

Now it was Skylar's turn to shrug. " Maybe, I'm not most guys." He smirked as he looked back up at Blake, who, to his surprise, wasn't paying attention to him anymore. Instead, she was looking at the library doors in which, as Skylar saw as he turned around in his seat, Brittany Melbrooks, Tiffany Wilder, and Bethany Hildens had stepped into the room. Often known as the social leaders of the school, the three friends had it all. They all had really nice cars, they were extremely pretty, and rich. Blake made it no secret that she hated them.

Ever since they had started high school, Blake and the leader of the group, Tiffany, had been bitter rivals. Mostly because Tiffany knew that Blake was even prettier than her without half a ton of makeup one her face. Another reason for there intense dislike to each other was the fact that her dad, who was the cheif of police around here, had once given her mother a ticket when Blake believed that she didn't even deserve one.

" OMG," exclaimed Tiffany when they got to Skylar and Blake's table. " Look who it is. It's the nerd and the cat lady!" Skylar knew that he should be a little offended by this, but all that he could think was: It's oh my God. Why can't you just freakin say oh my God?

" I'd rather be a cat lady then a blonde bimbo." Blake murmured out of the corner of her mouth. Tiffany's nostril's flared. " I am certaintly not a bimbo. Everybody knows that I'm the prettiest and the smartest girl in school. And, as we all know, looks are the only thing that matters in the real world."

" Looks mean nothing, you idiot. And we all know that Sky here is the smartest person in the school, not you." Blake said, and not for the first time, Skylar felt proud to call Blake his friend.

"True, but my mom is a whole lot smarter than him. Come on, girls, let's get away from these losers. They are soooo not worth our time." Tiffany said, and with that they walked to a table on the opposite side of the room. When they sat down, Skylar saw that they each made a big show of tossing their hair back as they dug their make-up out of their designer purses. Skylar couldn't believe how some girls could be all about make-up; he preferred natural beauty, as it were.

Skylar looked at Blake. " What was that about?" He asked. Blake didn't answer; she just kept staring at Tiffany with bitter hatred in her eyes. For a moment, just a tiny moment, Skylar was sure that he saw something glint in his friends eyes. That moment, however, soon passed and soon Blake's eyes looked as they were a minute ago.

"Blake?" He said as he gently shook her shoulders. In return, Blake shook her head furiously and said, " Sorry, she just gets on my ever lasting nerve sometimes. God, I wish that I could punch her in her so-called perfect face so many times that even if she had plastic surgery, she would still be called the ugliest person in the world." Blake crossed her arms over her chest, and Skylar knew that she was making a serious attempt to not stare at Tiffany, Brittany, and Bethany.

"Don't you think that's a little harsh?" Asked Skylar as he closed his math book and tucked his pencil behind his left ear, a habit which he had started in his elementary school years.

Blake snorted. " For her? Of course not!" At that moment, the bell rang to signify the changing of classes, and Skylar and Blake both stoodup to go to them. Just as he was walking out of the door, something caught Skyler out of the corner of his eye, and he went back to get it. It was a book about Egyptian hieroglyphs. The cover showed a picture of traditional ancient Egyptian art. Despite its age, it was in good condition- it looked as if nobody had checked it out, which, when Skylar had flipped to the back of the book, nobody had. On a crazy impulse, Skylar made his way over to the librarians desk, where he quickly checked the book out. Without a doubt, it was the single most impulsive thing that Skylar had ever done, and Skylar was never impulsive. Years later, he would question whether this simple doing was the best thing that he ever did, or the worst.

Author's notes- if you review, please give your honest opinion, but no flames please.


	4. Chapter 4

Skylar stared at the object in his hands, bewildered beyond belief. Luckily for him, today was election day, so he had gotten a day off from school. Which he had taken advantage of and spent the entire night attempting to figure the book out again. He set the book down onto his bed, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Even though he knew that he should accept the need for sleep, his mind wouldn't allow it; he was too overwhelmed by what he had discovered.

The night before, he had read the entire library book about heiroglyphs. About halfway through the process of reading, he noticed something very strange. A heiroglyph and the symbol in the book, they were the same.

After comparing more of the symbols with the egyptian hieroglyphs, he was, astoundingly, able to read the entire book. It was all very strange. It was as if he had known the language along, yet had somehow forgotten it. If this wasn't enough to astound him, the contents in the book were.

Fairies! A hidden world of fairies lay beneath his feet. It was spectacular to believe that there was a secret world that humans didn't even know existed. As he read the book, the feeling in the back of Skylar's mind that he had seen this before intensified. As he read a passage in the book about something that was called 'the ritual', he got a flash of something in his mind. Not like a mental image of the description in the book, more like a distant memory.

In the image in his mind, he saw a large oak tree at the bend of a river, a large clearing, and a silhouette bending over next to the tree. It was night time, yet the light of the moon made him able to see a little bit. As he watched, he saw the silhouettes mouth whisper something into the ground. Suddenly, blue sparks raced up the silhouettes arm and into its entire body. It was over almost as soon as it had begun.

Standing up, the figure turned around, as if to face him, and Skylar was able to see it in full view. It was some type of fairy- an elf, by what he had read from the book- and it was smiling at something. It was a female. She had short aubern colored hair, she was perhaps only three feet tall, and her eyes... her eyes were... strange to say the least. She had one dark blue eye, and one hazel eye.

The elf held out her hand to him and said, " Skylar." Skylar blinked. How did she know his name? The elf said his name again, yet more forcefully, and it was beginning to sound like Arabella. Wait a minute... It was Arabella!

Groaning, Skylar opened his eyes to see his sister's long blonde hair almost in his face. " Finally!" She said, exasperated. I thought you were never going to wake up!"

" What time is it?" He asked as he stretched to see the clock on his bedside table. It was half past noon. He must have fallen asleep while reading the book... that must have been the cause of the strange dream that he had. Now that he had woken up, he couldn't remember anything about it except for that elf.

" Blake's downstairs. She came about an hour ago." Arabella said, looking as if she wanted Skylar to say something.

" All right. Tell her I'll be down in a minute." Skylar said as he stood up from the bed. Arabella just rolled her eyes and left the room.

Quickly as he could, Skylar got dressed and put the book about the fairies under the mattress on his bed before going downstairs to the kitchen. True to Arabella's word, Blake sat at the kitchen table, studying her glue-on skull nails. She had decided to go all black today, with black jeans and a black long-sleeved t-shirt. Even her eyebrow ring, which would switch colors between a bright and a dark, was black.

She set her hand back down on the table and looked up at him. " ' Bout time you got up Sky. I was half tempted to pour a bucket of water over your head."

Skylar chuckled. "You wouldn't do that." He said, although he wasn't that sure himself. Blake could- at times- be unpredictable.

Blake raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really? I wouldn't do that? Think again, because I would." She said, smiling mischieviously at him. Skylar rolled his eyes as he made his way over to the fridge and brought out some left over pizza that he had had last night. He sat down at the table next to Blake, not even bothering to put it into the micowave to heat it up.

It was silent as he ate. His dad and mom, he presumed, had gone to vote in the election, and Arabella had gone to some other room in the house. Most likely her bedroom, because he didn't hear the T.V. on in the living room.

When he was done eating, he threw all of his trash away before rejoining Blake at the tabel. Almost as soon as he looked into her eyes, he got a bad feeling. " What are you thinking?" He asked hesitantly. The last time that Blake had had that look on her face, they had both gotten grounded for three weeks.

Blake shrugged. " Oh, nothing. I was just wandering if you wanted to go walk in the forest." Skylar stared at her, somewhat shocked by what she had just said. Didn't she remember what had remembered the last time that they had went to that forest? She had gotten burned- literally!

" But what about-" He cut off as she interupted him. " Yes I know what happened last time, but I don't care. It wasn't a big deal, anyway." She waved her hand aside as if to emphasize the fact that their last walk in the forest had been a piece of cake.

Blake stood up from the wooden chair. " Sky, you know that I'm going to go with or without you." She put her hands on her hips. A smug smile creeped its way into her face.

" All right." Skylar said, giving up. " I'll go for a walk in the forest with you." He stood up from the table. "But I'm bringing my drawing items with me." He said before racing back up to his room to retrieve the items. The drawing utensils, which he had neglected too open the pack that contained them, was sitting on his dresser. He quickly grabbed the pack of drawing utensils and a drawing notebook from beside of his door before rejoining Blake in the kitchen.

" You ready? " She asked, standing in front of the door that was in the kitchen.

" Almost." Skylar said. He layed his items next to the kitchen sink. " I have to tell Arabella where we'll be going, and I have to leave a note for my parents." Blake leaned against the door, making herself comfortable. " Take your time." She mumbled as Skylar went to his sister's room.

Unlike his own room, Arabella's room was on the the ground floor of their house. As he walked down the small carpeted hallway that led to his sister's room, he thought once again about the elf in his dream. He could remember her face almost perfectly, and though he knew that she couldn't possibly be a real elf, he felt as if he had seen her before he had had that dream. She felt... familiar almost.

Skylar sighed as he gripped the door handle to Arabella's room. His life made a whole lot more sense before that book came along.

He had barely turned the door knob before it was yanked open by Arabella herself. " What do you want?" She said, seemingly agitated. By Skylar's guess, he asumed that she was watching something about that one direction band, which- in Arabella's personal view- was the best band in the entire world. Skylar didn't think that her obsession with them would last long. Just two years ago, she had been obsessed with Justin Bieber before losing interest in him and thus stumbling upon one direction.

" Relax. I just came to tell you that I'm going to go on a walk with Blake in the forest." Skylar said as he watched Arabella smile unexpectedly.

" What?" He asked, unnerved by her sudden change of emotion.

Arabella stepped out of her room before saying, " Well.. the forest is a pretty secluded place, you know." Arabella said, and Skylar could almost imagine her texting her friends and gossiping about how her older brother was going on a walk with a girl.

" That's not what it's like and you know it Arabella, so don't tell your friends about it. OK?" Skylar said, and to his dissapointment, this sentence had the opposite effect then what he was intending for.

" Oh, so you two are dating?" Arabella said.

"What? No! Why would you even think something like that?" Skylar said.

" Well you are being awfully secretive..." Arabella trailed off at the end, and her smile grew bigger.

" I'm going on a walk with my best friend in the forest. How's that being secretive?" Skylar asked. Arabella just shrugged and returned to her room, presumbly to watch more stuff about her favorite pop bands and singers. Shaking his head, Skylar turned and walked away from his sister's bedroom door.

When he got back to the kitchen, he found a piece of paper and a pen. He told his parents in the note that he was going on a walk with Blake and that he would be back soon.

Placing the note onto the kitchen table, he looked up at Blake- who was still standing at the door- and said, " Now I'm ready."

* * *

One hour later, Blake and Skylar sat in a small clearing in the forest. Blake was sitting against a tree tree with her head tilted up and her eyes closed, and Skylar was sitting on a small tree stump, drawing.

Skylar finished the sketch of his drawing before coloring it with his special colored pencils. The thing that he had drew was that elf in his dream. The more that he thought about her, the more he was certain that he had seen her before, yet he couldn't remember ever seeing her. It was very confusing, and the more he pondered over the elf, the more he got confused.

As he finished his drawing of the elven lady, he looked at Blake, who appeared to have fallen asleep against the tree. He smiled almost absentmindedly at his friend. These were the moments in which he liked the most. Moments in which it seemed that he and Blake were the only living souls on the planet. Alone and wandering the Earth together as if every place they went to was theirs and theirs alone.

Skylar shook his head. This was only a fantasy. They weren't the only people in the world; it just felt like that since they were in a forest, away from civilization. The forest had always, apart from the sky, been Skylar's favorite place to be. It was a place of comfort for him. A place to escape from his troubles... at least, it had been. It didn't seem to be helping with his current predicament of feeling deja vu frequently these past few days.

Sighing, he finished the drawing and gathered up the items that he had brought from the house. Slowly, he walked over to Blake, who, as he saw, was most definetely asleep. Leaning down, Skylar gently shook her shoulder's, trying to wake her from her slumber.

After a minute or two, Blake opened her eyes. " Come on." Skylar said, helping Blake up from the ground. "Let's go back to the house." Blake nodded, and soon they were walking back the way that they had came.

Walking with Blake alone through the forest, Skylar couldn't help but think that this was perfect, and that nothing could never harm them. How very wrong he was.

Author's notes- Yes, Skylar may seem to learn the language of the book too quickly but, as everything else in this story, it was intentional.

If you review, please give your honest opinion, but no flames, please.


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